Science Base

To ask the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry what the overall international ranking has been of the United Kingdom's science and engineering base in terms of quality, relevance and cost-effectiveness in each of the last four years.[125923]

[holding answer 14 June 2000]: Comparisons at an international level are complicated by the different organisational structure within each country corresponding to the UK Science and Engineering Base, and hence rankings have to be treated with some care. We are continuing to refine our data, but the currently available information in terms of the following measures for the G7 countries (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK and US) is given in the table for the years 1994 to 1997, the latest year for which information is available for all the countries.

Quality

Relevance

Cost effectiveness

1994

2

1

1

1995

2

1

1

1996

2

1

1

1997

2

1

1

Notes:

1Quality—total number of citations to papers originating from the UK, or having at least one author in the UK.

2Relevance—Proportion of funds for Higher Education Research and Development (HERD) from non-Government sources.

3Cost-effectiveness-papers published per £1 million of science base expenditure.